“I’m not stopping you,” I said, as I continued to walk toward the house.
“No, Valerie. Not there. I’m not going in there. Can we talk in the studio?” he asked.
I turned and glanced at the house, then at the studio and felt like I just wanted to curl up and die, our home had once been our sanctuary, and he’d just told me it wasn’t any longer. I shrugged my shoulders, “I guess, let’s get this over with,” I said, in a defeated tone.
He walked purposely ahead of me, pushed the studio door open and held it for me to walk in past him. My heart was pounding wildly, full of love, hurt, and disappointment. It felt like getting a root canal at the dentist, but unlike the relief from pain afterward I thought it may well be a chronic condition. I headed straight for the water dispenser, suddenly parched, and poured myself a glass of water before pulling out a chair by the table, using the table as a physical barrier between us. Flynn sat heavily on the sofa near the other side.
“So?” I asked, barely able to look at him for fear of bursting into tears and begging him to stay. I’d never have done that, but I loved him so much that every minute without him had seemed like a lifetime. It was brutal.
“I’m sorry,” he said, his face appeared ashen, and the look he gave me made me want to throw my arms around him. The sadness in his eyes reflected my own feelings of devastation. Then I reminded myself how I felt when I saw the pictures and stayed in my seat, motionless, and my anger seeped up to the surface again.
“You’re sorry? For what, Flynn? Sorry for walking out on me? Sorry for taking my son away from me because I had to be sure about those pictures? For barging into my studio, and acting like a fucking caveman in my place of work despite those other things?”
“I get it,” he said, quietly. I saw a plea in his eyes when I met his gaze, “I understand how hard it is for you, and I shouldn’t have been surprised you needed more information. I realize you weren’t mistrusting me, and you never outright said you didn’t.”
Flynn’s eager eyes raked over me from across the table and even though we were arguing, I saw that familiar want in his eyes. I flicked my hair behind my shoulder and crossed my legs, conscious of his scrutiny, “Is that supposed to be some kind of bone you are throwing me? Like I should feel grateful you get it? When Bernie drugged you, and you were lying slumped on that sofa, your trousers undone, I could have turned and walked out of there, and many girls would have done just that, Flynn.”
I shook my head as my angry eyes met his again and locked him in a pointed stare, “I looked at the facts back then. You were stoned. No doubt about that. Bernie had kept Simone and me away for over an hour. There were groupie girls hanging around in that dressing room, Flynn. I could easily have thought they’d blown you, and you’d passed out. That’s how it had looked,” I said, twisting the little gold ring on my finger.
“The only thing that I couldn’t figure out was why you’d do that to me. If you’d given me time to digest those pictures by talking their existence through with me, I probably would have come to the same conclusion I had that night when I called an ambulance for you. I did that because I gave you my trust then.”
Flynn cleared his throat and ran his hand through his hair. When he didn’t say anything I carried on talking.
“There are a hundred different ways of looking at this, Flynn. Yeah, maybe I should have said I believed you instantly and allowed you to think everything was okay. I could have done that but I would have still conducted my own investigation on the down low to accept what I’d said. That wouldn’t have been honest, but it would have given me time to find out what the real deal was. Maybe I should have told you not to come home in the first place. Or maybe you should have trusted me to work it out.”
I sat silently, watching him struggle with a range of emotions, from anger to sadness and everything in between and I knew there was no way on this earth I could live without him in my life, but I had to teach him that what he did was below the belt, and I wasn’t going to roll over. Otherwise, a few months down the line we’d have been right back at that very point again.
“I do have some answers about the pictures now if you want to hear them.”
“Not really, Flynn. It’s too late for explanations. If you’d stayed here with me then sure, I’d have been happy to know more about how she managed to take those shots. You made my choices for me. If those pictures had been me in that bed and some guy was standing at the end of my bed in boxer briefs, would you have felt ready to accept what I said?”
His jaw ticked in frustration, and he stared at his hands before raising his eyes to meet mine, “Probably not,” he admitted.
“And there’s your reason why I couldn’t just blindly accept what you told me. If I did that, I’d be a doormat. I’m an intelligent woman, Flynn. I’m not going to believe things when there is no logical explanation. I’d be a fool to do that. The love in my heart is pure. My mind is a different matter; I don’t trust lightly.”
“So, where does that leave us?”
“It leaves us with a mess to sort through. Liam is what matters. As for the band, I can be professional. I’ll manage the band, but ask Javier to step up for the overseas trips. I’ve been thinking about our living arrangements as well, and I spoke to my mom. When Kayden moves out next month, her and my dad are going to move Helen and Alison into my room and Kayden’s. The cabin will be free for you to use. You can stay here when you are recording, it’s easy for accessing the studio. I’m far enough away that I won’t really have much contact, but you are close enough to see, Liam every day.”
“You’ve got it all figured out as usual, haven’t you?” he said, sounding tired.
“What is that supposed to mean?”
“That’s it. We’re moving on?”
“Is that a question or a statement, Flynn? You’re the one that spun out of here.”
“I know, but I’ve had time to think,” he said, in a gentle, remorseful tone.
“Me too. I’ve done nothing but think these past few days. You took my son and left me here alone when you should have been reassuring me—fighting for me. Fighting for us. How dare you punish me like that.”
I glared at Flynn, still angry at what I’d been through in the past few days and his eyes reflected the tortured look of someone who knew he was wrong. Fear flashed in them, and he moved from the comfortable seated position he’d been in to the edge of the sofa, and drew in a long deep breath. Rubbing his hands, he gave me a rare glimpse of his past.
“My life has been unconventional, Valerie. Extraordinary in one of two ways, luck and tragedy. What I’ve seen and done in my young life is more than many men that live to be a hundred would have. I witnessed the murder of my mother and my brother. I saw my father do those things to the people I loved most in this world. He was the one man I should have been able to trust to keep us all safe. After that, I lived in an environment where trust was rare, and respect, no matter how hard I tried to gain it, was unachievable. I lived in a home where everyone around me had been traumatized or let down in the same way. I’d made up my mind when I walked out of that place, that if I was honest and someone couldn’t give me their trust in return, I had no business with them. The feeling of constantly having to prove myself to all those people that lived and worked there was soul destroying.”
Flynn rarely opened up, and despite how hurt I felt, I heard the pain in his voice, along with the legacy he’d carried and buried from his past, and that made his behavior much less offensive to me.
“Whenever there has been anything I’ve had to explain—to justify— you’ve always brought up your past experiences with Bradley and Daryl as a way of making your insecurities acceptable. That was them, Valerie. Not me. I have never done anything to hurt you intentionally. I’ve made some mistakes, and yeah, initially I kept some things to myself, but that was to protect you from hurting.”
Silence followed as he stared intensely into my eyes. It felt
too long in one sense, but he finally spoke again.
“Right here, in my heart, the weight of my feelings for you and our son almost crush me at times. There have been days when I’ve woken and watched you sleeping, and my emotions almost choked me to look at you. Sometimes that feeling of love would be overpowered by my worst fears that something bad would take you away from me. The days that I’ve spent away from you feel like someone has cut off my oxygen supply so as I can’t breathe properly. We’re damaged people Valerie. Both of us. Being away from you has made me wonder if being with someone who is as damaged as I am, is toxic.”
“I’m damaged because I won’t give you my blind trust?”
“No, you’re damaged because like me, you know what it’s like to love and lose someone you never imagined losing. You’re damaged because like me, you never dealt with it at the time. Did you have counseling after Martin and Adam died? I don’t mean the six-week bereavement shit that’s offered to survivors of traumatic events. I mean the really deep stuff that helps you accept and move on.”
“I was fine. I pushed through all of that and work kept me sane.”
“Exactly, just like I threw myself into my music. Neither of us dealt with it properly. Neither of us took the time to just breathe. To accept that it was okay to fall apart. To accept the help that was offered. To take the time to heal.”
“I’m fine. Even though I think about my brothers every day, I don’t let what happened consume me. It was terrible at the time, but I’ve accepted it.”
“Really? So I’m going to ask you this, Valerie. Why won’t you marry me?”
Tears sprang to my eyes and a lump formed in my throat, “I never wanted to trap you. I wanted you to stay because I was who you wanted to be with, not because you felt you had to.”
“Bullshit Valerie. It’s because you thought I’d leave you like Martin, Adam and Ziggy did. Do you know how many times I’ve wanted to ask you that question properly? Do you know how much it would mean to me if you said yes? Do you know what it feels like to live with that question on the tip of your tongue for years and not being able to ask for fear of another rejection?”
Streams of tears dripped off my chin in a steady flow as I sat quietly. Outwardly, I appeared sad and motionless, inside my heart was thumping erratically at his words.
“I really never wanted to trap you into this, Flynn. We moved way too fast—”
“What would you trap me into, Valerie? The greatest feelings of love I’ve had in my whole life? The passion and feeling of belonging I’ve strived for ever since my world ended when my mom died? A family that I would give my life for in a heartbeat?”
He stood up slowly and walked around the table to where I was sitting. Crouching down beside me he cradled my face between his hands. His callused thumbs wiped away my salty tears as his eyes searched deep into my soul. My heart instantly squeezed and calmed when he touched me. His careful, deliberate movements held everything I loved about him. Flynn was my protector.
“Valerie, I’d never marry you out of some sense of duty, or because it was the right thing to do by you and Liam. I want you to be my wife because there is no one else on this earth that I could ever imagine spending my life with, and the one person I couldn’t imagine spending my life without. You are everything my heart desires. You’re my hopes, dreams, fantasies and wishes, and most importantly my heart is yours, whether we marry or not. It’s yours whether we remain together after this or not.”
I closed my eyes for a second, overwhelmed again by the way I loved him, the way my heart felt heavy because we were fighting and most of all because he’d said what I needed to hear so badly. I swallowed down more tears and opened my eyes to meet his gaze.
Looking sad his gaze dropped to look at my lips, and he licked his own then locked his stare into my eyes again, “I love you with everything I am, Valerie Darsin, don’t you see that’s why your trust is so important to me?” I did. Everything he’d said was straight from the heart, totally unrehearsed and raw.
Before he could say anything else I caved, my arms reached out and circled his neck, pulling him closer. I leaned my forehead to his and swallowed nervously, “We’re a mess, Flynn,” I whispered.
“Yeah, we are, but think how much more of a mess we’d be apart,” he muttered softly and brushed my nose with his. He pulled his head back to search my eyes again, and obviously saw my agreement at what he said before he dropped it back to lean against mine. “Babe, nothing is as important as us and Liam. Nothing is as important to me as seeing you smile,” he offered with a small half smile before brushing his lips against mine. I pressed my lips to his more firmly in reaction, and he pulled back to look at me again.
We sat there without words, as I allowed my hands to fist his hair, threading through the locks in a soothing gesture as he held my head in his hands. The intensity of our chemistry began to bubble between us, and we both pulled back before it became make-up sex. Doing that would have made what was happening between us cheap.
“Maybe we should go home and talk until we can’t talk anymore and when we get up tomorrow we’ll talk some more,” he said.
I nodded as he stood and pulled me to stand beside him. We both moved forward to hug each other at the same time, both smiling that we’d had the same need in that moment. Resting my head against his chest I was instantly consumed and comforted by his familiar scent. His warm arms enveloped me in a bone crushing, desperate hug while his soothing hand brushed my hair behind my shoulders. Leaning into my neck he inhaled deeply and sighed before drawing back to smile at me.
“Yesterday was my last day without you. I’ve been a stupid fuck. Thank God, we’re rational people, babe, even if we behave irrationally at times. We’ll work it out. Let’s get Liam and order some takeout. When he goes to bed we’ll figure out what we do next.”
Chapter 16
Taking time
Flynn
After talking for almost two days straight, Valerie and I had come to the conclusion that as much as we hated to admit it we both needed to seek help to deal with the stuff from our past. We agreed her trust issues, and my need to be trusted would eventually destroy our relationship if we didn’t do something about it.
Contacting Clay, I asked him to find a discreet therapist who would come to the house to do couples therapy sessions with us while we were on a hiatus, and within less than an hour he’d identified a possible counselor who was willing to do home sessions.
Dr. Loretta Garcia was a family therapist who’d dealt with victims of trauma and post-traumatic stress for over forty years. Initially, I couldn’t get past the fact that she looked like a grandmother from a Mexican food ad that was currently airing on TV. Plump and homely with a kind face, she waved off the offer of my hand for a handshake in greeting and pulled me in for a hug instead.
“When you’re my age, you never pass on the chance to hug a hot man, especially a rock star,” she chuckled and then did the same to Valerie.
Valerie wasn’t offended in the slightest and smiled widely at her gesture, whereas I was a little perturbed by her initial welcome. I had never expected a doctor to display such a personal thought in such a public or physical way, especially at the outset of a relationship where we’d expect discretion and confidentiality.
About twenty minutes into the first session, I was wondering if we’d done the right thing and because of that my answers to her questions were a little stilted. I had issues airing the mere fact of what my father had done, so I was worried about sharing what I remembered from the traumatic event that had shaped me. Valerie, on the other hand, monopolized most of the session by talking about her brothers and her feelings about their deaths. I was in awe at her ability to talk openly with a stranger, but then again the circumstances of her losses were far removed from mine.
Loretta, as she insisted we call her, gave us homework to do each evening, and set appointments for every other day, for our intensive sessions. There
were only three rules, we didn’t have sex until Loretta had completed the block of sessions, we respected each other’s feelings and opinions, and lastly, we completed the therapy once it had started.
After assessing our needs in the first consultation, she explained the sessions would normally take place weekly. Time and schedules on both sides were at a premium, and we knew neither of us could fit in the twelve session counselling course to deal with the trust issues between us. So, she agreed to condense the twelve sessions and attempt to be as effective as she could for us.
It was pretty liberating once we got going. It made a huge difference to me that I trusted Valerie to know all my secrets, even though the details of my traumatic event were pretty sketchy at best. During one particular session, we had to tell the other the worst thing we’d ever done. Apparently, facing our own fears and knowing the person we love the most accepted the good with the bad helped to build that trust. We then had to tell each other how that disclosure made us feel about each other.
My biggest issue to work through was not going to my family’s funerals. My mother and brother were cremated, and when I was asked if I wanted to be at the service and later— to scatter their ashes— I’d refused. I hadn’t wanted to be reminded of that awful night and what I’d seen.
Valerie’s reaction was immediate. She threw her arms around my neck and reassured me that nothing that happened that night was my fault, and I shouldn’t accept the blame for my father’s actions. She said I should never have had to face something that horrible at such a young age. She told me she’d felt the same when it came to saying goodbye to her brothers and said if it hadn’t been for me, she might not have made it to their service either. Her gentle acceptance and the way she’d handled that gave me some closure regarding something that had plagued me my entire life since.
That night was the first time I talked openly about my feelings with her, and admitted I’d remembered more than I’d ever admitted to anyone about that night. I suppose I was finally ready to face that I hadn’t done anything that night to stop it. I remember feeling paralyzed with fear, and the only thing I thought with any clarity was that I was going to be next. While I was telling my story, my breath hitched as a flashback of that night came to me from nowhere. My dad’s hands were around my neck, and the scream I’d remembered from the hospital wasn’t in fact, my brother’s, but mine.
Ready For Flynn,Part 3: A Rockstar Romance: Ready For Flynn Series Page 15